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Meet the Artist……Cheryl Frances-Hoad

Who or what inspired you to take up composing and make it your career?

I heard a ‘cello being played on the radio (I can’t remember who was playing) when I was about 6, and just knew that was the instrument I had to play. I fully intended to just become an internationally famous concert ‘cellist (as you do!) but gradually composing took over.

Who or what are the most important influences on your playing?

As a composer I think my greatest influences came from the music I played at the Yehudi Menuhin School (I studied ‘cello, piano and composition there for 10 years). But some of my favourite composers are Britten, Ligeti, Beethoven and Prokofiev, as well as many composers who are writing today.

What have been the greatest challenges of your career so far?

Trying to get a balance between composing and life: I’ve still not quite worked it out, although, after hardly going out the house for six months whilst writing an opera, I’m determined to be a bit better at it!

What are the particular challenges/excitements of working with an orchestra/ensemble?

Working with any group is exciting for me. I think as long as you treat musicians with the respect they deserve, and prepare parts properly (enough time for page turns!) then they will hopefully be receptive to your music.

Which recordings are you most proud of?

To date I’ve only had one recording released: my debut album The Glory Tree. It features a lot of my chamber music and is released by Champs Hill Records. About thirty musicians were involved in the recording (most had premiered/commissioned the works) and we spent three days recording it: probably some of the best days of my composing life so far. You can read a review of it here:

My second CD, of vocal works, featuring the singers Jennifer Johnston, Natalie Raybould and Jane Manning, with pianists Joseph Middleton and Alisdair Hogarth, is coming out soon, also with Champs Hill Records.

Do you have a favourite concert venue?

Not really, as a composer you are just very grateful that your music is being played! Perhaps I’ll get pickier about this later in life! I had a mini opera performed in park in Hammersmith – a group of children gathered round and started answering the questions the singers were posing – it was fantastic!

Who are your favourite musicians?

I’ve mentioned the composers above…I’ve been so lucky and had such a fantastic time with all the performers who have performed my work: there are too many to list!

What is your most memorable concert experience?

I had my Concertino for Cello, Piano, Percussion and orchestra performed by the BBC Philharmonic as part of the BBC Young Composers Competition (when it still existed, back in 1996). I think that experience more than any other convinced me that I wanted to make composing my career. It was just mind-blowing to hear something that I’d only heard in my head played by a massive orchestra.

What is your favourite music to play? To listen to?

I don’t regularly play in public any more, but I play keyboards in a salsa band and am also learning jazz piano. I played in a rock band until recently and am soon to join a hip hop band – all very different from my composing life, and my past life as a cellist at the Yehudi Menuhin School!

Recently I’ve hardly been listening to music not directly related to my work (for my opera I listened to a lot of 1930’s dance music for instance as this was one of the main influences) because I’ve been writing so much – something I’m determined to rectify soon.

What do you consider to be the most important ideas and concepts to impart to aspiring musicians/students?

I think you just have to be determined to the point of utter bloody minded-ness. Part of the reason why I’ve managed to make a kind-of living out of composing is that I have always just refused to acknowledge that it might not be possible. I recently got a new composing job after applying for it twice – although I’ve applied for other opportunities up to ten times before I’ve finally been awarded them. A thick skin for rejection is very useful I think, and somewhere (however deep down) you need total self confidence in what you are writing, even if this partly achieved by self-deception…

What is your present state of mind?

My present state of mind is probably calmer and happier than I’ve ever been. Everything seems to be fitting into place recently and I’ve come to realise that life outside of composing is also very important (something which I perhaps didn’t when I was younger). The older I get, the happier I get, which is rather fortunate for me!

In 2008 Cheryl was awarded a Leverhulme Trust Artists in Residence Fellowship at the University of Cambridge, enabling her to investigate aspects of the mind at the Psychiatry Department, which resulted in a new work for piano premiered at the 2009 Cambridge Clinical Neuroscience and Mental Health Symposium. Also In 2008, Cheryl was awarded the Wicklow County Council Per Cent for Arts Commission (Ireland), which enabled her to compose her first piano concerto, premiered by Bobby Chen and the Greystones Orchestra in May 2009.

Cheryl’s work has been premiered in some of the world’s most important chamber music venues, including the Wigmore Hall (Melancholia (piano trio), Excelsus (solo ‘cello) and My fleeting Angel (piano trio)) and the Purcell Room (The Glory Tree (for soprano and six instruments), and The Ogre Lover (for string trio)). Her debut CD of chamber works, The Glory Tree, was released in 2011 by Champs Hill records and received excellent reviews in The Times, Telegraph and Guardian, and was chosen as “Chamber Music Choice” by BBC Music Magazine in October 2011. Her second CD, of vocal works, is due for release in July 2012.

Future works include an Olympic-inspired work for the Lawson Trio and Chamber Music 2000 (to be premiered at the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, early 2012), a song cycle inspired by Darwin’s legacy (to be premiered in Leeds, 2012), a new Canticle to be premiered by the Prince Consort to be premiered on the exact centenary of Britten’s birth (at the Wigmore Hall, 22nd November 2013) and a new opera, Amy’s Last Dive, with a libretto by Adam Strickson, to be premiered as part of the Yorkshire Cultural Olympiad programme in July 2012 in Bridlington and Leeds.

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